


Book VI part 2

by aralias



Category: Blake's 7
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, M/M, Unofficial Sequel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-15
Updated: 2014-12-15
Packaged: 2018-03-01 16:06:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,274
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2779304
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aralias/pseuds/aralias
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Completely unauthorised and AU spin-off of the late great <a href="http://fanlore.org/wiki/From_the_Log_of_the_Hellhound">Hellhound</a> series of the 1980s and 90s.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Book VI part 2

**Author's Note:**

> I wasn't going to post this publically, but I keep forgetting I've written it, so here it is.
> 
>  **Original notes from the first posting on my DW/LJ in June 2014:**  
> 
> Light spoilers: For everything up until the end of book VI, but they are pretty light. I think. Also strongly references 'The Weight of a Feather' (Southern Lights 2.5), but then so does the damn non-B/A canon source material. 
> 
> Notes: For all I know this is what happens in book VII. I don't know, I haven't read it. But I assume not, because reviews of book IX tell me that Blake has a 'new love' (I am guessing it is not Avon). I wanted to get something like this written when I was only breaking up one couple to do it... 
> 
> There's a traditional 'story so far' business at the beginning, in case you either don't remember what happened or just don't know. I think you could definitely read this if you haven't read Hellhound, but hopefully you'll like it more if you have. 
> 
> Like the last time I wrote a spin-off of someone else's fic, I haven't really written their version of the characters, I've written mine... with (this time) a bit of a Hellhound twist. 
> 
> **New notes from AO3 posting December 2014:**
> 
> This is not what happens in book VII ;)
> 
> If you are Katarina Larkin (nee? Synder) and Susanne Tilley (nee? McGhin), please let me know if you want this taken down and I will take it down. But please also consider writing Book X. 
> 
> If you know nothing about Hellhound and want to know more about what the hell is going on in this fic, you could do worse than to read [the Fanlore page](http://fanlore.org/wiki/From_the_Log_of_the_Hellhound) that I helped write.

HELLHOUND SO FAR . . .  
Avon stood over Blake’s dead body . . .  
  
It’s PGP and various things have happened that I won’t go into here. This is set after book VI and is instead of book VII, which I've read about 10 pages of, but which seems good as usual. Book VI featured the capture of Avon’s ship, the Hellhound, by Federation forces. With the help of Blake’s nephew and a group of Raldeeni pirates, the crew of theHellhound escaped and re-captured her. Unfortunately, during this altercation, Blake was shot in the stomach. But only once. I assume he recovers.  
  
For numerous reasons, and not only because the Hellhound shooting is definitely intended to parallel the GP shooting in the original, you could just about read this as a regular PGP fic if you want.  
  


[ ](http://s1180.photobucket.com/user/aralias2/media/hellhound.gif.html)

  
  
Book VI part 2  
Given that he’d been unconscious since he’d been brought to the planet, Blake had managed to acquire a surprisingly large number of possessions in a short time. Bev had stopped by earlier and had left a bag to haul them all back to his cabin on the Hellhound. For a moment, when she’d offered, he’d imagined she’d brought him one of hers, which were all bright colours in soft, shiny material, studded with little gemstones.  
    //I’d have looked rather strange carrying that around the base.//  
    Then she’d grinned and thrown one of his old, brown satchels on the bed next to him. It was into this that Blake was packing the get-well card from Sevran (signed by Steffany, Vila, Morton and Blood), the two sets of clothes that he assumed Steffany had thought he might need, the grapes from Vila (//where did he find those, I wonder//), carefully labelled pill-bottles from Payne, a map of the Raldeeni base that Dayna had drawn for him, a list of possible next targets in Tarrant’s handwriting, and some sprigs of what looked like rosemary in a jar from Dafydd and some poppies from Morton. The plants gave him some idea of what the landscape might be like outside the walls of the base, and that his two young protégées weren’t quite ready to give up on competing for his attention.  
    //Nothing from Avon, but then I didn’t really expect there to be.  
    //Though I know he’s been in here while I’ve been asleep. Nobody’s said, but I know Avon.  
    //And I remember how he looked when I was shot. Just before I blacked out.  
    //Devastated.  
    //But he would have been able to go on, if I’d been killed. I know he would have been able to go on. After all, he has Steffany...//  
    Steffany White, the psychiatrist who had helped Blake regain his memory, had been Avon’s lover for at least the last two years. She was a kind, clever, compassionate and stubborn woman. Blake liked her very much, but had never had any sexual feelings for her.  
    //Possibly because we’re too much alike.//  
    He knew her understanding and her love was doing Avon good. Avon had been a broken man when he’d found Blake on Danyg without any memory of the Liberator or her crew. Now, he was still damaged, but getting better. And that was definitely down to the same woman who had cured Blake.  
    //Why do I always make myself think about Steffany when I think about Avon’s feelings for me?  
    //Probably better if I don’t examine that one too closely.//  
    Blake slung the now-heavy satchel over his shoulder. He took a step forward and then turned to inspect the medical lab in case he’d forgotten something. Tarrant had been clear that they’d been given the base by the Raldeeni and could stay as long as they liked, so Blake knew he could come back to find anything he’d left behind. But there would be hell to pay if anyone discovered their lovingly chosen gift had been abandoned.  
    //What it is to be a leader! Always having to take everyone’s opinions into consideration before I make any choice, no matter how small. Not something I’m naturally inclined to do. In fact, I’m not really naturally inclined to be a leader at all.  
    //But apparently I can’t stop people following me.//  
    Behind him, the door opened. “Two hours awake after five days in a coma and you’re already checking yourself out of the hospital,” Avon’s voice said. “Does that seem like a good idea, Blake? I’ll help you with the question, if you’re still too fuzzy from the recent coma to answer it. It is not a good idea.”  
    “Nice of you to drop by, Avon,” Blake said wryly. He turned and saw Avon lounging against the door-frame, effectively blocking the exit. He was wearing the tight leather trousers and silver-healed boots that were his trademark now, topped with a crisp, white shirt open at the neck to show the diamond cross.   
    “I might drop by again in a better mood if I knew you were staying put,” Avon said.  
    “The advice from my doctors is that I could begin to move around again if I took it easy. I am taking it easy.”  
    “That’s not what Steffany told me,” Avon said.  
    //Whoops. I didn’t think he’d have had time to talk to her yet.//  
    “Isn’t it?” Blake said neutrally.  
    “No. She told me that she and Payne both advocated a week’s bed rest. You said you’d be damned if you were going to sit around and do nothing while the rest of us worked to get this base up to scratch and refused to listen to any advice. Steffany says she then agreed to let you out tomorrow if you were willing to wait for me and Dayna to build you a wheelchair. Apparently you agreed.”  
    “Mm. And how’s the work progressing?” Blake asked.  
    “She asked me to do that ten minutes ago,” Avon said, “so I’m not quite finished yet. I asked her who was watching you to make sure you didn’t try and leave before it was done, and she said she didn’t think that was likely considering you could hardly stand. I said... you don’tknow him like I do.”  
    “True,” Blake said with a smile. “Are you going to get out of the way?”  
    “No,” Avon said crisply.  
    Blake sighed and turned back to the bed. He put the satchel down again and, behind him, heard Avon take a step forward – towards him, and out of the doorway.  
    //This might be my only chance.//  
    Abandoning his satchel, Blake swung back round and took a few long strides towards the door. His plan had been to rush past Avon, but the wound in his stomach was less healed than he’d been hoping and he staggered. Avon caught him before he could fall.  
    “Don’t try that again,” Avon said, attempting to push him back in the direction of the bed.  
    “Try-?” Blake began and let his knees go out from under him, as though he’d been caught by another stab of pain mid-sentence. Avon tried to adjust his grip on Blake’s elbow as his weight dropped, and Blake pulled himself free. He took another few steps and then, out in the corridor, his legs really did collapse. Without Avon there to catch him, he fell, the floor hitting him hard on the shins and balls of his hands. The air left his lungs, leaving him gasping.  
    “Blake!” Avon shouted from behind him, his tone as agonised as if Blake had just been shot again and was now dying. Avon’s hands took his shoulders and turned him onto his back. “You stupid, reckless-” He broke off as he realised Blake was laughing.  
    “I’m all right,” Blake told him between breathless chuckles.  
    “Idiot,” Avon said in disgust. He sat back on his heels, his face as white as the streak in his dark hair. He rubbed a hand over his eyes for a moment, concealing whatever he was feeling.  
    //What is he feeling? Surely he didn’t really think I was dying then...//  
    Avon lowered his hand and glared.   
    //Yes, he did. Oh, Avon.//  
    “I’m all right,” Blake repeated. “Bruised, chastened, winded, but all right.”  
    Avon raised an eyebrow. “Chastened?”  
    “Moderately, and I’m sure temporarily,” Blake conceded, which finally got a smile out of Avon. “But enough that, if you help me up now, I promise I won’t try and make a break for it again today.” He held out a hand for Avon to pull him up with.  
    Avon grimaced. “Are your promises worth anything?” he asked, but he pushed himself to his feet and took Blake’s hand in his. Blake let Avon pull him up, catching hold of Avon’s shoulder for support, and then jerked his body towards the corridor again, as though trying to escape. Avon glared and tightened his grip around Blake’s waist.  
    “Joke,” Blake explained.  
    “Funny,” Avon said. “Not your feint for freedom - funny how the memory cheats. I remember you having a better sense of humour.”  
    Blake pretended to be offended. “Sorry. I’ll try harder to not to disappoint.”  
    “You do that.”  
    “I remember you laughing. Admittedly, mostly at your own jokes.”  
    Avon looked thoughtful. “I think I remember laughing at something Vila said... once. Three years ago. And thinking about it, it may not have been a joke. He may just have fallen over-” The corner of his mouth twitched, and then this movement turned into a proper smile as he realised Blake was grinning back at him.  
    //He’s very handsome when he smiles.  
    //And he’s still holding me up. I wonder if he’s realised that.//  
    There were only a few inches between them. Blake had been this close to Avon several times on the Liberator, but not since. It had been several years and they had both changed. Avon had lost a lot of weight and had gone through so many harrowing experiences since they’d been part of that first crew.  
    //I suppose I should probably be thinking how old he looks now in comparison to the way he looked on the Liberator.  
    //But he just looks like Avon.//  
    Blake leant forward, crossing the few inches between them, and pressed a kiss to Avon’s lips.  
    Instantly the arm around his waist withdrew. Avon shoved him roughly back towards the doorframe, his eyes flashing.  
    “Why the hell did you do that?” he demanded.  
    “I didn’t realise it would go down so badly,” Blake complained, clutching the wall for support. Avon’s eyebrows rose dangerously, and Blake scowled. “That’s not what I meant. I don’t know. Perhaps - instinct.”  
    “Instinct?” Avon repeated.  
    “Yes.”  
    “Your first answer was better,” Avon snarled. “You don’t rely on instinct, Blake. You plan. You plan well. You would not do anything as stupid as rely on instinct.”  
    “This time, I-”  
    “No,” Avon said, cutting him off. “What do you want from me, Blake?”  
    //I don’t know.  
    //Perhaps if the kiss had lasted longer I would have been able to tell how I feel.//  
    Blake let himself slide down the doorframe until he was sitting on the floor. It was too difficult to stand without support.  
    Eventually he said, “I don’t know,” aloud because he hadn’t thought of anything better to say.  
    “Neither do I,” Avon snapped. He paced the medical lab, like a caged beast, although he could easily step past Blake if he wanted to. “Two idiots, bumbling around looking for data that does not apparently exist.”  
    //I know where we could find some more,// Blake thought. An image of himself and Avon making out against the wall, like the teenagers he’d had to dutifully break up in the school on Danyg, rose unbidden in his mind. He shut his eyes.  
    //Avon is with Steffany. And I- I’ve never wanted a man before.  
    //Except him. That night Vila told me that Avon had brought a man back to the Liberator as his shore-leave pick up. I did consider it then.  
    //Before I decided to walk away without knocking on his door. He would have been free then. He might well have turned me down, of course, but something in me thinks he wouldn’t have done that. Arrogance perhaps, or just the way he used to look at me. Very similar to the way he looked at me five minutes ago.  
    //And if he hadn’t turned me down... what then? Would we have slept together, or would I have realised it was a mistake before it got that far? Could we have ever been in a relationship like the one I was in with Jenna or Jeanine?  
    //No use thinking about the past. The times when I didn’t take action. This is what’s happening now.  
    //Now – when he’s with Steffany.  
    //I like Steffany. Steffany is good for him. Steffany loves him. And I- I don’t even know how I feel about him.  
    //Except that I like him, too.  
    //More than I like Steffany.  
    //But that really doesn’t make it right.//  
    “I’m sorry,” Blake said into his hands. “I don’t know what’s got into me. Since Jeanine died- I haven’t- That is-” He stopped again. “I know it was inappropriate of me to make a move on you now. I do understand that.”  
    “Well, that’s something,” Avon said sulkily and sat down on the bed Blake had woken up in earlier that morning.  
    “I don’t feel like I’m making bad decisions in my day to day life, but it is possible,” Blake continued. “I’ve been under a lot of stress. I slept with a married woman on DorVail-”  
    “What?” Avon demanded. “Why? Who?”  
    //Jealous, Avon?//  
    “I don’t think it’s really important,” Blake said.  
    “I’m sure she’d be delighted with that assessment,” Avon sneered, “but it could be important for us. What if MacIvar – I assume it was his wife, given that there were no other eligible matrons around – decides to come after us?”  
    “I think you damaged that relationship enough by killing his second-in-command, and he let us go then,” Blake said wryly.  
    “He should be grateful that I saved his sons from the things Marc did to me.”  
    “I didn’t say it was a bad idea, just that it looked bad.”  
    “Whereas screwing the man’s wife in a field was a brilliant piece of PR!”  
    Blake must have grimaced at the world ‘field’, because Avon said, “You didn’t\- Not in a field.”  
    “That’s the part you’re angriest about?”   
    “I’m not angry,” Avon said, trying to make this seem even slightly plausible by steadying his voice. “Adultery is rather a commonplace sin. Anna was married when I met her. She tried to kill me afterwards, of course, but that’s not really the point.”  
    “You’re just looking after my welfare, I suppose,” Blake said sarcastically.  
    “No,” Avon said. “That is not it. I’m not angry, I just don’t understand you any more. I can’t believe you did that, Blake. How couldyou? How could you?”  
    Blake sighed, all the fire draining out of him. “I was just – lonely,” he said quietly.  
    “And I suppose that’s why you kissed me, too,” Avon said. “How flattering.”  
    “No,” Blake said, surprising himself with how aggressive this sounded. “That’s not it. Not with you.”  
    “Then why?” Avon said desperately.  
    //He looks almost like he’s begging.  
    //I can’t fob him off with another ‘I don’t know’ this time.//  
    “I have... considered kissing you before,” Blake said slowly. “I chose not to on those previous occasions for a number of reasons that I won’t go into now because I’m genuinely not sure what all of them are, but most of them are rooted in some sort of fear. I think,” he frowned, “I kissed you today because I wanted to and... because I thought, unconsciously... I think I knew that you would have to refuse me. I could kiss you – something I’ve thought about for years – without it leading to anything else. I’m afraid that’s not very flattering either, but I think it might be closer to the truth than anything else. Steffany could probably do better. I’m quite new to psychoanalysis.”  
    Avon seemed to crumple into his hands. “Oh hell," he said through his fingers, “I’m going to have to tell Steffany.”  
    //He hasn’t thought about Steffany at all, throughout this conversation,// Blake thought, with a stirring of unwarranted and unsettling triumph.  
    “Even if you do tell her,” he said, keeping his voice reasonable, “you can tell her that you didn’t kiss me back and yelled at me about it for ten minutes. And if you don’t tell her, which I would prefer, then Icertainly won’t.”  
    “What about when I want you to move into my cabin instead of her?” Avon snarled. “Do you think I’ll have to tell her, then, Blake? Or should I let her find it out on her own? Which would be kinder?”  
    “You want what?” Blake said.  
    “I refuse to repeat myself since you’re neither deaf, nor incapable of understanding a simple statement.”  
    “You want me to move into your cabin.”  
    “That is what I said. I knew you’d heard.”  
    “And Steffany’s out? Just like that? She’s incredible, you do know that? Kind, clever, beautiful. Next to her, I’m just-”  
    “I know,” Avon said. “She doesn’t deserve this. She killed for me the day you got shot – she told me she thinks it was worth it. I expect she will probably have to do some re-evaluating of priorities, like the rest of us. Perhaps she will even look at Vila for a change-”  
    “Vila?” Blake said stupidly. “What’s Vila got to- You mean, he’s in love with Steffany?”  
    “Oh yes,” Avon said. “I watch the people who watch those I love very carefully. Vila is interested.” He raised an eyebrow in response to his own words. “Hmm. Apparently I was in love with Steffany. That's the first time I've ever admitted it.”  
    “Was,” Blake said. “Past tense. All I had to do was kiss you and it’s over?”  
    “Well,” Avon said, “I came back from another universe for you.”  
    He smiled slightly, and Blake’s heart clenched.  
    //I don’t deserve this, either.//  
    “Avon-”  
    “And for the chance to kill Servalan,” Avon said. “Don’t get too emotional.”  
    Blake laughed, and shook his head at that impossibility. “All right,” he said to oblige Avon. He looked back at Avon, who was watching him with a predatory gleam in his eye.  
    //I’m going to have sex with a man,// Blake thought, suddenly nervous. //Worse than that - I’m going to have sex with Avon.  
    //Avon who apparently loves me above all things. Who has thrown over his wonderful lover – ex lover, I suppose – for me. On the strength of one rushed and awkward kiss.  
    //What have I done?// He bit down on the edge of one of his fingers, and chewed it thoughtfully.  
    //Probably what I should have done years ago.//  
    “Scared?” Avon asked him with a sharp grin.  
    “Yes,” Blake said challengingly. “You’ve offered a rather terrifying emotional commitment that I’m now supposed to return. I’ve never been in a homosexual relationship before. I’m probably going to lose a least one of my doctors, one of my friends. If not more. I never set out to be a homewrecker-” He considered this. “Well, not figuratively. And I’ve always aimed to target largely military installations...”  
    Avon laughed, a real laugh, and got up off the bed. He walked over to where Blake was still sitting in the doorway, and held out his hand. “There’s still time to change your mind.”  
    “Mm,” Blake said, taking the offered hand and letting Avon haul him to his feet, “I’d rather not, if it’s all the same to you.”  
    “Blake,” Avon told him, “nothing is the same any more. Trust me.”  
       
They made out against the wall like teenagers.


End file.
